Meta on Monday announced a partnership with sports performance equipment manufacturing company Oakley. The collaboration, simply dubbed as Oakley Meta, will result in the development of a new generation of smart glasses which are speculated to be aimed at cyclists and other athletes. The Oakley Meta smart glasses will most likely be the third product developed between Meta and a subsidiary of the Italian eyewear company Luxottica, following the introduction of Ray-Ban Stories and Ray-Ban Meta Glasses in 2021 and 2023, respectively.
Meta announced the Oakley partnership in a post on Instagram via a new handle, “Oakleymeta”. However, the company did not delve into any details, with the post simply captioned as “The next evolution is coming on June 20.”
While information remains under wraps, this is most likely a nod to the Ray-Ban Meta Glasses successor which was rumoured to be in development earlier this year. In January, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman stated that the company was expanding its smart glasses technology to other brands under the umbrella of Luxottica Group SA.
The next generation of smart glasses is reportedly dubbed “Supernova 2”. It is said to be based on the design of Oakley Sphaera, a multi-sport usage sunglasses from the company. As such, Meta could aim its upcoming smart glasses towards cyclists and other athletes, unlike the current Ray-Ban Meta Glasses which are universally designed for all use cases.
A notable change is expected to be in terms of the placement of the camera. While the Ray-Ban Meta Glasses sport a camera on the left side of the frame, the Oakley Meta glasses will reportedly have a lens placed at the centre of the glasses frame, which could affect the point-of-view (PoV) visible in the footage captured with the smart glasses.
Meta is yet to reveal other details, such as the design of the smart glasses, renders, and specifications. We can expect more details to surface on June 20.
